1000 Years Of Love
by NotAWeakHarryPotter
Summary: Harry is hit with an unidentifiable curse, and suddenly everything changes. This is a tale of sorrow, love, and a young man's journey to understand. Loads of angst ahead.


**Death**

…

Before us great Death stands

Our fate held close within his quiet hands.

When with proud joy we lift Life's red wine

To drink deep of the mystic shining cup

And ecstasy through all our being leaps—

Death bows his head and weeps.

…

 **Rainer Maria Rilke**

* * *

There comes a time in one's life when their idealistic world, carefully weaved and masterfully constructed with facades, comes crashing down before their very eyes.

As I quietly sat down on the cold, hard, and unyielding chair, I hear the words echoing inside my head. Neurons inside my brain are firing rapidly across synapses, all telling me one thing. I don't care.

 _Worsening decay. Spreading. Unresponsive. Incurable. Terribly sorry. Options. Arrangements._

Mother sits next to me, legs crossed, her makeup running down her face in heavy, inky and colourful rivers. "How long till he wakes up?" is all she asks.

The mediwitch is a classmate of mine from Hogwarts. She's a good person. She glances towards me, blatantly projecting sympathy in his gaze, presuming what they all do. I don't mind so much. "In a couple of days. Until the curse stabilizes in his system."

I have more questions running through my mind, trying to burst out of their filter, but Mum is on her feet. "Thank you, Mrs. Davies. Let's not bother the poor witch and leave." And she is out of the room. I start to follow, but hesitate, walking back to conjure flowers for my father.

"James, wait! I'm so sorry, so terribly sorry," says my old friend. "We can make him comfortable. That's the least I can do."

I laugh, my voice hoarse and scratchy from roars of rage. I'm surprised to hear it come out of my mouth. "He's never been comfortable in his life. There's no need to start now."

* * *

We say nothing once we apparate back home. I run into the living room, endlessly staring out of the enchanted glass window. _Look at the world, still turning, still feeling and still hurting. I've fallen off the untameable horse of progress._ My mother's hands run across the photographs. Looking, tossing, stacking. I have no idea what she's doing.

I just stand there, paralyzed by shock. "Mother." She doesn't respond, her eyes blank as she reminisces of the moments she and Harry cheated from time, space and reality itself. "Mother!"

"I'm not interested in examining my mental state right now, James, which clearly is your objective. I fear if I utter his name I may go catatonic and fly into an apocalyptic rage."

"Then how about your physical state?

She snorts, the pig-like sound grating against my ears. "Given what I've just been told, what could possibly matter now?"

"We need to talk about it, not hide it!"

"About what?" She tosses down a stack of photographs and turns to face me. "That my husband is in St Mungo's and will slowly wither away?" The bitter words strike me like the deep thump of a rough bludger, right in my face. "I suspect that it's you who needs to talk about it."

"Yes, all right, I do. Mum…"

"My only concern is how long I'll be able to stand living without him."

I'm incredulous. "How long you can stand living _without_ him _?_ How are you so calm – we depend on him for everything: money, shelter and protection!"

She stops, finally, and faces me. "I raised you up from when you were a child, from changing your diapers, feeding you and caring for you. _Don't you dare raise your voice at me!"_

I take a deep breath. _Detach. Float away like a balloon. Tether it to you so you can draw it back later. "_ He's been in a coma for four weeks… He'll wake up, but by the time that happens we'll have lost a lot of time with him. He might not be long for this world."

She sombrely nods and walks out the door to presumably apparate away, leaving the door open when the rain starts to fall.

My mind has not yet touched the reality that he is leaving. I can barely remember life without him in it. He's slyly imbedded himself into all my memories, as if he'd been there all along.

He's there in the Auror office, sitting on my desk, commenting on the other bedraggled wizards, bothering me when I'm trying to cast offensive spells at dark wizards – the remnants of the Death Eaters. He's at Hogwarts, interrupting my study time to drag me over to the morgue, stealing my textbooks and marking them up in red ink when he finds errors. He's at school with me, at home, in the park I played in as a child.

I stand in our living room and watch as my mother walks farther and farther away, eventually dissolving into nothingness. At some point over my lifetime, he and I have become a hybrid. James-and-Harry. The graft has been so complete that even when we're separated, for days or weeks or years as has occasionally occurred, I still feel the invisible seam that joins me to him. For a moment, I'm angry. Because he won't be the one who'll have to hold on to hope, because he won't be the one who has to cut away half of himself and go back to being a singular entity. James-and-[redacted]. The seam will remain, though. I will bear the scar down my centre to remind me of what I've lost.

We introduce each other as father and son. What we really mean is that we are friends divided by a age gap. People sometimes assume that we're twins. None are accurate descriptions. I'm not sure that the English language, nay, any language in the entire world, can describe our complex relationship.

All I know is that there is a deep pit in my chest and it's yawning wider and hollower the longer I see my father in this unresponsive state.

I grab an umbrella from the rack before walking out the door, closing it softly behind me. My stomach is cramping, causing me to fall on my knees in the wet dirt. I make it past the anti-apparation ward and apparate.

I keep it together until I get to Evangeline's. Yet another relationship in my life that defies categorization. Girlfriend? No. Friend? Yes, but so much more. Fuck buddy? On occasion. These terms might apply, except she's been more privy to what I go through with my father than anyone. She knows about the inescapable, the seemingly inseparable seam. It's made us unable to have what we started out hoping for, but yet unable to retreat into a safe zone of friendship. So we hover here in the land of undefined. She dates other people. I just have my father.

She sees my face and my body chilled to the bone and pulls me inside. "What's happened?"

I'm shaking. Suddenly the mask I've been wearing for four weeks shatters like glass. "Harry."

"What's he done now?"

"He's gone and gotten himself cursed with an incurable curse."

* * *

I refuse to look away, even as my lips trembled and my shoulders heaved with emotion, choosing to stare into Evangeline's emerald eyes. My dark lashes brimmed heavy with tears; my hands clenched into shaking fists, in a desperate battle against the grief. A lone tear traced down my cheek, and just like that, the floodgates opened.

The sobs were stifled at first as I attempted to hide my grief. Then, little by little, I was overcome by the relentless waves of emotions. The crashed against my fragile defences, washing them away in salty tears.

My walls, the walls that hold me up, make me strong just... collapse. Moment by moment, they fall. Salty drops fall from my chin, drenching my shirt. I press my head against the wall... viridian green eyes, so innocent... I am anything but innocent. I'm trembling. I can't-can't stop. Even as I press my hand against the wall it shakes, it trembles. It's raw, everything, raw tears, raw emotions. I can't stop... I can't stop. _Why can I not stop crying?_

I imagine in that moment that I was a picture of grief, loss, and devastation. I wept, tears streaming from my hazel eyes, loud, heaving sobs tearing from my throat, and still I did not look away.

Not until the sobs drove me to my knees did my determined gaze fall.

All the while Evangeline was holding me in her warm embrace, sending emotional support across the bond created by my grief.

I tell her everything – about how my father has been in a coma for four weeks and about how my mother isn't acting the same. I half-expect her to march me out her door and kick me out for babbling nonsense, but she just nods and offers comfort.

"How long do you think it'll be before – the situation is leaked?" she asks, quietly.

I am holding a cold washcloth over my swollen face. I can't go home looking like this. "I don't think more than a couple more days. It's been already supressed for weeks, Evangeline. I first was aware of his accident almost a month ago, for fuck's sake." I hear my voice cracking.

Evangeline smooths the hair back from my temple. "I'm so sorry, James."

"It isn't fair. Why him?"

"Why anyone?"

"But he's – we need him. People don't know what he does, how much he does that isn't publicised. I scrub at my face with the damp cloth, letting my head fall back to the couch. "I've got to get back. I need time off work. He shouldn't be alone. He may wake up and I might not be there beside him."

She shakes her head. "Of course. But that isn't why." I blankly look at her. "It's ok to admit it."

"What?"

"That you want to spend as much time with him as possible before the end."

My lip trembles again. _The end. The end of him. God, it can't be true._ "I thought I had all the time in the world."

Evangeline hugs me again and I cry some more. I feel silly and weak, but it's best to get it out now. I can't do this in front of my father.

And she's right. As soon as I'm back home, I won't be leaving his side again.

* * *

He lays there on the hospital bed. I don't go to work. I spend hours in my vigil, watching for a sign. He doesn't respond, so neither do I. I catch quick naps late in the night, when nary a soul passes through the halls.

I take Kingsley aside and quietly explain the situation. He looks stricken, but his impenetrable mask snaps into place. I promise to let him know when Harry wakes up. I do the same for Ron and Hermione. I know that they'll spread the word.

Mother is adamant that we not tell the press. For once, I agree. If we do, we'll never keep them from disturbing us. We'll wait until it can't be put off any longer.

For a few days father seems no different. Then, I occasionally see a twitch in his facial muscles.

One day after that twitch, I find his arms and legs occasionally moving.

He soon wakes up, but everything is different. It's off. Harry can't focus his eyes, nor respond to the cries of joy. He simply just stares off into space.

The doctors claim that it's a sign of improvement, but I'm not impressed. They say that it'll take years before he was somewhat back to his original state.

 _But I don't have years. I only have months._

Nothing changes as days fly by – work, visit, work, visit, work, visit – and those memories we made together begin to blur. _Was I twelve when I received my first broom and flew with him? Or was I thirteen?_

Life continues onward, and I slowly return to my job. Thoughts of my father are immediately repressed and I visit him less and less. It just hurts too much for me to bear.

But one day when I visit him, his eyes are lucid and clear. Those emerald orbs stare at me intensely, scrutinizing my scruffy look and stuffy tears.

"Why are you crying son?

I gave a start, surprised. "Are you really up? I… I just can't believe it took you so long to wake up! Hold on… I'm going to inform –"

"Wake up? What do you mean wake up? I just got hit with a single spell from a fleeing Death Eater. I'm fine, get me out of -"

"I'll explain later," I hurriedly exclaimed, my legs pumping to find a nearby doctor.

"Don't take too long James! I think I might lay down for a rest soon."

When I return with the doctor in tow 5 minutes later, we find Harry curled up into a ball, his heart thumping in accordance with slow, shallow breaths. Serenity was plastered across his face as he slept. At peace, his consciousness swirled in the land of dreams, oblivious to the physical world.

I took a moment to embrace this moment – _I might not ever see him like this ever again. To think I ever took this for granted._ After three night shifts and only a few hours of sleep in the day, I was completely drained. Simply seeing my father reinvigorated me; I'd never thought I'd be here when he woke up.

It seemed that fate did not allow for my father to fully awaken as the doctors said he had relapsed, and the curse and slowly crept nearer towards my father's heart.

Fate is not kind. I knew that. It snatched what it could, taking people who were far too young, far too good. It didn't pretend to care, it didn't pretend to distinguish.

* * *

I'm going to the hospital from Diagon Alley when I meet Hermione coming down. She looks pale and worn, her bronze tan replaced by ivory white skin. "Oh, James," she mildly says, "Sorry I missed you."

"Then you shouldn't have waited until I went out to come by," I say, irritated. If Hermione thinks I'm stupid then she hasn't been paying attention.

"I have some business matters I need to discuss with you – things pertaining to his will and more."

I nod. "You know he's not going to respond." I don't have time for her right now. I need to see my father.

Harry is still reclined in his bed, his face ever so serene. I sit down on the chair next to him as Hermione awkwardly shuffles into the room.

She holds out some paperwork. I recognize it. It's a copy of Dad's will, complete with his signature and fingerprint. "In the event that Lord Potter-Black passes away," she says, "James Sirius Potter will be bequeathed 10,000 gallons and the antiques known as the Marauder's Map and the Invisibility Cloak."

I would have thought that I'd have some feeling about this, but I don't. It's just as she says. Just gold and old dusty antiques. I sign the papers. "There."

She's frowning. "I didn't expect you to be so – equitable."

"I won't need it. It just reminds me more of him."

"I hope you are right."

I just stare at her. She looks back. I am deafened by the noise we are not saying.

* * *

Two months later Harry awakens again. He gingerly climbs down from the elevated hospital bed and stumbles twice, nearly falling. The second time I guide him to a nearby sofa and sit him down. He has been very quiet this day, yet his head burns, ransacked by fever.

"I can hear whispers inside my head, James," he whispers. I detect a slight tremor in his voice. "It began the moment I woke up and opened my eyes."

I just nod. "I hear them too. They never do go away, do they?"

"I can't stand the voice – it tells me to perform despicable acts. Acts like rape, murder and more. Help me James…" He looks at me, pleading.

"I wish I could stop it," I whisper.

He reaches out and grabs my hand. I grip it tightly like a lifeline.

I call for the doctors and they take his blood pressure. It's high. His pulse is racing, compounded with the fact that he has a high temperature. Slowly, after hours of conversation and coaxing, Harry "claims" that the voice has left him alone to think in peace, and promptly falls asleep on my shoulder.

The next morning, Harry's headache is so bad he can barely blink his eyes or bring himself to speak. The doctors have upped the medication for this day, and they help. He insists on changing into his normal clothes. He pretends that nothing's wrong, and that everything will be fixed soon.

The first order of business is to get Harry to the bathroom so that he may relieve himself. I bring Harry his walker and he feebly moves towards his goal, his eyes shining with determination.

That is, until he falls face first on the ground, his muscles spasming. It hurts to see such a powerful man brought down to his knees, yet is such a humbling experience.

This man who struggles to go to the bathroom brought down the worst Dark Lord ever. This man who struggles to communicate properly singlehandedly brought down corrupt legislation and rooted out the disguised Death Eaters.

 _Would I be like him too? One day I might be too slow in shielding to block a spell. One day I might get shot in the back by a spell due to a petty criminal wanting revenge._

Then Harry sees his friends. Today, Luna is our first visitor. She's making an extra-special effort to be cheerful and pretend that she's totally ignorant of everything she's not supposed to know. "I've been wandering in Sweden and found this necklace for you. It's made out of butterbeer caps and is supposed to ward away the Crumple-Horned Snorkack's that fly around your head," she says, handing me a necklace.

I pause, halted in my tracks like a deer in the headlights. "I'm sure Harry will recover soon. I'm convinced he will. He has to!"

Luna walks up to me and grabs my shirt, pulling me down to her level. She whispers, "James, if you're going to try to help him recover, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a hospital chair. It could mean you wasting your life away. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery-isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will me better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is. Trust me."

"Teach me, Aunt Luna. Teach me. Teach me how to help him damn it! I don't care about the consequences as long as he's back to normal!"

"You can tell yourself that you would be willing to lose everything you have in order to get something you want. But it's a catch-22: all of those things you're willing to lose are what make you recognizable. Lose them, and you've lost yourself. I won't teach a desperate man."

"What do you mean? I'll have father back and I won't lose anything! He's all the matters anyway!"

That's not what I meant –"

"Shut up Aunt Luna! You're the one deluding yourself. I don't matter in this world like my father does! He kept us as a country together and I'll never be able to surpass him! He's too important to die!"

She sighs. "The wide world is not all about you and not your father: you can fence yourselves in, but you cannot forever fence it out. That's all the advice I have for you. It's up to you to decide what you want to do with this advice James."

* * *

We barely have a moment's peace that day. Harry is glad for it. I'm less so. I'm jealous of the time he has left, every precious minute that goes by is one I don't get to spend with him, not as long as there are other people trooping through, one right after another.

Some people he's helped stop by, just to bring him pastries that taste like ash. Some people bring bouquets, not knowing that bright flowers wither without sunlight. Some people stop by, giving him their well-wishes – as if that would heal him.

Night falls. Harry hasn't been out of the bed much today. I need to see how his balance, so during a moment of intermission I get him up and watch him walk about. He seems more or less steady with the aid of the walker, occasionally stumbling.

His hand physically shakes with exertion and his knuckles turn white as he grimly grips his walker to go to the bathroom.

Harry hollers from the bathroom. "How long am I going to be stuck here James? I've got to get up and stop that Death Eater. I'm sure he's after revenge, and I can't let him hurt –"

"Dad, you can't do shit! You're still wounded and I'll be damned if I let you run off and die like you did during the war!" Harry looks shocked. "You thought that nobody would find those letters hidden in that little nook in the wall did you? I know everything. Mom can't lose you now."

"Tell me what's wrong with me then James! It's kept so hush-hush that not even I know what I'm stuck with. The doctors and nurses tell me that you've ordered them to a vow of silence. Tell me I'm wrong, that my son won't do this to me! WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME."

A lump forms in my throat; my voice cracks when I try to speak. "You've been –"

The nurse knocks at the door. Once, twice, and three times.

"I'll talk to you later dad. I promise I'll tell you."

And I'm out of time.

I want to tell him about the his diagnosis – that he most likely will never make it out of this hospital room alive.

He's too fragile. Too precious. To know this early during this stage of fighting the curse could break him.

I'm ushered out of the room and into the cafeteria. While there, I hear whispering and rumours floating around the room just waiting to be plucked out of the sky. They say his health is getting worse and worse. The muscle fibres that had previously been so intertwined, just like our minds, are beginning to deteriorate at a monstrous rate. They estimate, at best, that he has a month left to live.

* * *

I fall asleep, my restless mind sliding into a dream.

Dad is healthy and can walk by himself. Mom is by his side, chatting with our esteemed guests, being the perfect wife and socialite.

They suddenly break from talking to the Shacklebolt and his companion and head my way.

I can't breathe. But when they near, their faces change. My dad's gentle smile turns upside down and his face hardens. My mother's face scrunches up, her eyebrows twitching with rage.

They speak at the same time. "You're pathetic."

"What can I do," I plead, "The real you is stuck on a hospital bed almost every hour of the day!"

The amalgamation of their voice scares me. "You can start by going back to your normal life! You are meant to live, to be free! That's what we fought for during the war, and you throw it away for nothing! What you're doing is pointless!

Everybody is destined for death, but not everyone truly lives! At the least, tell me things that I don't already know!

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shrivelled and closed from fear of further pain! I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see beauty even when it's not pretty, every day, and if you can source your own life from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, "Yes!"

It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to survive.

It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the centre of the fire with me and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

Live and don't look back."

And with that, I truly wake up.

* * *

 _Sometimes, t_ _he most important things are the hardest to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them — words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head to no more than living size when they're brought out._

 _But it's more than that, isn't it? The most important things lie too close to wherever your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to a treasure your enemies would love to steal away. And you may make revelations that cost you dearly only to have people look at you in a funny way, not understanding what you've said at all, or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it._

 _That's the worst, I think. When the secret stays locked within not for want of a teller but for want of an understanding ear._

I slowly stroll towards the hospital suite, towards my inevitable doom. The hallway has as much personality as the rest of the hospital. The floor is slate grey and the walls dove. The light is too bright for my eyes after the darkening gloom outside. I find it abrasive. Perhaps it may even bring on one of my migraines.

It does trigger a migraine. I suddenly stop. My head feels lightheaded and all I can feel is an endless thumping.

Thump, Thump, Thump.

That's all I feel, all I hear. Each pound inside my head sends agony coursing through my fragile nerves to my brain. I feel as if my brain, my skull and my head is being repeatedly smashed by a bludger.

All I want is silence and to be left alone, but voices surround me. They yell and shout at me, causing the vibrations and resonance of the voices to ring inside my head.

All of a sudden, I feel my body fall, weightless and insignificant. Then came the pain, and I was suddenly jerked back to harsh reality. The first thing I noticed when I came to was the crowd of people gathered around me, peering at me, simply observing.

I push myself off the ground, dusting myself off and walking forward, head held high. I had come to a revelation during that dream. I had to tell Harry of his diagnosis. He had every right to know. He needed the time more than his selfish son.

I nudge the door open, eyes cast downwards. Harry drops the reports he was previously reading and stares at me, his gaze staring into my bare soul.

I trembled as I tried to explain my actions.

"I'm sorry dad. I shouldn't have kept it from you for so long. You deserve to know," I mumbled.

"So how bad is this curse? I've been in debilitating pain for the past couple of weeks ever since I woke up. When will I be able to –"

My throat suddenly dries up. "You won't be able to do anything you want to do unless it's in this room. That "harmless" curse that hit you turned out to be similar to what happened to Dumbledore."

"What... what do you mean," Harry says, his voice sounding heavy and worn.

"You're dying, Harry, and nothing can save you. The curse will… it will… slowly break down the components inside your body that keep it running. We're keeping it contained at the moment with potions and spells, but this spell uses your own body's magic against the potions and spells. DO YOU NOW UNDERSTAND WHY I TRIED TO KEEP IT FROM YOU?"

Harry turns away from me and stares at a generic painting. "James?"

"What?"

"I didn't deserve to know? I DESERVE TO KNOW THAT I'M DYING!"

"I just wanted our time to be ours," my timid voice replies, "I wanted you to remain you till the end – not a pale imitation of yourself. I can't stand to see you suffer."

Harry sighs, the lines of his face deepening. "Son, don't be so selfish. It's time to let go. I'm not afraid of death. Albus once told me that Death is just life's next big adventure. So dream big and spread your wings James. It's time for you to leave the nest and face reality."

I turn around and walk away with tears streaming down my face.

* * *

The next time I see my father is near his deathbed.

He is breathing slowly, deliberately. I want to talk but I don't know what to say, or if it'll help either of us. He looks at me. "James…" he begins, and I see the fear in his eyes. "I thought I was ready for this." His voice trembles.

"I'm here, dad. I'm here."

"I'm afraid, James." I have never heard his voice so small.

Nothing I do will ever be this important again.

I lean down and firmly hug him, holding him in my arms. He is so thin. He folds into an unbelievably small space; my arms can encircle him completely. He grabs a handful of my robes and lets out a shaky breath. "Just relax," I whisper.

"I don't want to leave you."

"I don't want you to go."

"I want you to be the last thing I see," he rasps.

I hold his gaze. I feel every second like a blade against my skin but I hold it. I won't look away because this is sacred and I'm long past the point of saving anyway. He takes a few deep breaths and sags. His eyes close.

He is sleeping now. It won't be long.

I gather himself close, wrap myself around him, yet the warmth never returns. It slowly dissipates. I'm fully aware that I'm blabbering now and I don't know what I'm saying, but I can't stop. I can't stop.

He takes his last breath a few minutes later. Exhale, and then – nothing.

I stare down at his face. It's not real.

It is not real.

* * *

Harry lies in his casket as I deliver his eulogy.

"Summing up my father's life, I keep coming back to one thought. Never will you meet a man who more faithfully lived his values.

My father was a teacher of all things. His method was simple. He taught by example. At any age, when faced with an ethical dilemma, after reflection, study, or even rationalization, I find myself coming back to one simple question. What would Dad do? His character is the foundation of my conscience.

My father's teachings are endless. Let me share a few.

My father never let another man down. He fulfilled every obligation he ever undertook. His word was his bond, and everyone knew it. I never heard him utter a lie, nor intentionally deceive.

My father was self-made and self-reliant. From his education to his career, from his skill with his wand, my Dad engaged with the world as a man who would be its master.

My father relished the good things in life including art and music, travel and dueling, food and wine, and friends and family.

My father never made an enemy. Not one. While he most surely came across a few people he couldn't countenance, he solved the problem by simply avoiding them. He always insisted that violence never solved any problem. He never once hit another man in anger.

My father was loyal. His faithfulness to the important people in his life could be seen in the way he steadfastly maintained ties with his childhood friends. From Hogwarts where they grew up through the weddings, christenings, holidays, and now wakes and funerals that mark the arc of life, my Dad could always be counted on to be there.

My father was never stingy. Though he was a child of abusive adoptive parents, he understood the value of a dollar and the importance of saving, the generosity he expressed with his money matched his generosity of spirit.

My father spoke openly of his admiration for the female figure, yet as far as I know he never kissed another woman besides my mother. And he loved my mother with every bone in his body, his visible affection overcoming his usual reserve. Dad's unflagging support for Mom's personal development in her career and in life created the perfect balance creating a childhood for me and my sister.

Only once did I ever see my father cry. Just before his death. And while I knew Dad was as torn up inside as I was, his crying ceased long before mine did. Because he knew it was his job to be the rock for me to lean on even until the end.

My father had a quiet dignity, respecting himself the way he respected others. As he faced his final days, his body ravaged with an unknown curse, he occasionally lost his good humour. But he never had one moment of self-pity. The day before he passed when the mediwitch asked him how he was doing, he gave the same answer he gave every day. I'm fine.

Farewell, Dad. You did good. You did real good."

As everyone sobbed in their seats, their eyes red and puffy, I hold my head up high.

 _I'll miss you._


End file.
